


Making Rain

by Todesengel



Series: Steampunk!Seven [13]
Category: The Magnificent Seven (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Steampunk, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-04
Updated: 2014-05-04
Packaged: 2018-01-21 22:42:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 519
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1566671
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Todesengel/pseuds/Todesengel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes, nature needs a little prompting.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Making Rain

**Author's Note:**

> For the prompt (paraphrased): A steampunk!Seven approach to the commonly held belief that artillery causes rain.

The only thing JD found surprising about seeing Old Moses hooked up to a mule team outside the church was the fact that Old Moses was still intact. The last time JD saw it, the big gun had been heading full steam ahead – literally – toward a gulch, then he’d been too busy diving for cover as the thing started firing. 

As JD got closer he could see that not only was Old Moses still intact but looking no worse for the wear from its little unplanned excursion. In fact, JD would’ve sworn that Old Moses was actually looking _better_ – and not only that, but it looked like Josiah had modified the continuous firing mechanism so that the barrels pointed up and not straight ahead. It looked like Josiah had modified the breech as well, to allow for longer projectiles – at least JD assumed that was what the stack of cardboard tubes resting in the loading mechanism were, though he had no idea why Josiah would want to fire off cardboard sticks. He was just about to break open one of the tubes and see what was inside them when Josiah came out of the church wearing what he liked to call his “going out” gear – thick leather gloves, double reinforced blacksmith’s apron, and his welding goggles perched on his head.

JD put the stick back in the hopper and grinned up at Josiah. “Howdy Josiah. What’s this for?”

“Well, JD,” Josiah said as he unhitched the mules, “I reckon today I’d try my hand at making it rain.”

“Rain?” JD asked, falling in step with Josiah as he led the mules towards his favorite testing field. 

“Indeed.” Josiah grinned down benevolently and said, as though imparting some great secret, “I don’t know if you noticed, JD, but it has been a mite dry in these parts.”

“Yeah,” JD said, thinking about the steadily lowering level of the swimming hole; if they had another month of drought he reckoned they’d have to rename it the swimming puddle. ‘Course that wasn’t the worse thing ‘bout the drought; seemed like the hotter and drier it got, the hotter and fiercer folks tempers ran. “I noticed.”

“And so,” Josiah said, “I thought I’d bring some rain before we got so dry we combusted.” 

“With Old Moses?”

“Yup,” Josiah said, patting the gun fondly. “You do know the theory postulating that artillery fire causes rain, of course. I reckon that the idea is the loud report of the guns trick the sky into thinking it’s thunder, which summons the clouds and lightning.”

“Josiah,” JD said after a minute of hard thinking, “that’s the biggest load of horseshit anybody’s ever tried to hand to me.”

“I just said it was a theory, not that I believed. Personally, I reckon that with the right combination of chemicals we can convince the clouds to release their burden of water.”

“Yeah?” JD squinted up at the mercilessly blue sky. “And how do you reckon on making it rain when there ain’t no clouds?”

“Oh there are always clouds,” Josiah said. “It’s all just a matter of finding them.”


End file.
